A Saviour Passing By
by PrincessDaydream77
Summary: When Jean Valjean went to the Thénardiers to fetch Cosette on Fantine's instruction, he had not realised that his own sister had been desperate enough to do the same with her own daughter.
1. Heartbreak Farewells

A Saviour Passing By

Summary: When Jean Valjean went to the Thénardiers to fetch Cosette on Fantine's instruction, he had not realised that his own sister had been desperate enough to do the same with her own daughter.

Disclaimer: _Who am I? _Not the owner of Les Mis, so don't sue me!

Chapter One

Nineteen years had passed since Marina Sarcozet had last seen her elder brother, Jean. Nineteen years since her eldest son, Lucas, had nearly starved to death, only three years old. Nineteen years since he had been imprisoned for stealing a loaf of bread to save him.

Since then, Marina had been left alone with her eldest son, not to mention her three other children, another boy of fifteen named Pierre, and two girls, one of eleven named Bernadette, and one of just three months named Ebony. Her husband had died just a few weeks after Bernadette was born, which the woman had been eternally thankful for. Richard Sarcozet had been an abusive husband right from the beginning and Marina had been so close to killing him herself. The only problem was that when her husband died, she only had three children. Now, eleven years later, she had four.

She had had no choice. The children were starving, they hadn't eaten for three days. She had to get money somehow, so she had gone down to the docks of the town she lived in. She had only remained there for one night, long enough to earn her ten francs, enough money to get her children bread for the next couple of weeks. That had been a year ago, and she had not had to go back since. Local people had taken pity on her children, giving them the leftovers from their own meals. Until she had given birth, everything had been fine. Until Ebony was born, which was when she had finally been disgraced.

Ebony was a bastard. There was no other way of putting it, that was what she was. She looked utterly different from the other children, with chestnut brown hair and the same shade in her eyes, pretty in difference as opposed to the classical beauty of her other children. It didn't mean that Marina loved her youngest daughter any less, of course not, but in the eyes of the rest of the world, she was the scum of the earth. She did not want that inflicted on her child. So that was why she had to let her go.

Leaving the younger two alone with Lucas, Marina packed up a few things in a bag, wrapped Ebony up in blankets and went on her way. In truth, she did not know where she was going, but she had to find somewhere. She could not bear to watch her child be shunned like she would be if she remained in the town.

It had been the worst decision the woman had ever had to make, the most painful and probably the most vital. With one less mouth to feed, the other children had their chance at survival, while Ebony would get the life she deserved with the new family she would receive.

It had taken three long hours of walking along the treacherous roads, but Marina had finally reached the edge of Montfermeil. She had visited the town once before, just three months ago, and recalled a certain inn where a young baby had rested in a pram, being attended to meticulously by a woman that seemed to be the innkeeper's wife. It seemed to be the perfect place for Ebony.

Glancing up at the sky, which had now turned an inky black with the approaching of twilight, Marina was enveloped by the shadow the inn had cast on the dimly lit street. The shadow it was about to cast over her life.

The shadow was split by a shaft of light, as the door of the inn opened wide. There in the doorway stood the very woman that Marina had been thinking of. The innkeeper's wife. Her daughter's new mother.

"Is that her?" the woman asked, indicating the sleeping baby enfolded in the other's arms.

"Yes. This is Ebony." The woman scarcely listened to her, instead reaching out her arms for the girl. Marina obliged with a well hidden reluctance, handing over her youngest daughter to a woman that she had met only half a dozen times before.

"Her name can't stay the same. You know that?" asked the woman, smiling as Ebony curled a finger around one of her blonde curls.

"I know. But it could be similar, couldn't it?" Marina asked, hoping that the answer would be yes. Of course, she knew that her daughter would have to start her life completely afresh, but there was still a part of her that wanted every possible way of finding the girl, should her circumstance in life ever change.

"I suppose. I'll think of something." she responded, acquiescing to the woman's request, though she seemed rather reluctant to do so.

"Thank you, Madame." Marina said, tears beginning to swim in her emerald eyes. It was then that she reached out and stroked the cheek of her baby girl, who had now begun to waken. Knowing that she would want a moment to say her goodbyes, the innkeeper's wife returned Ebony to her mother, returning to the doorway while the woman spoke her final words to her daughter.

"Now, Ebony, I want you to make me proud. I want you to become a fine, educated lady, with a loving husband and beautiful children, just as I have always wanted for you. I want you to desire the world, and do all you have to do to attain it. I want you to have everything I never did. That is why I need to say goodbye to you."

When Marina finally handed over her daughter, she was nearly sobbing, and Ebony was much the same. She turned her back almost immediately, beginning the exhausting journey home. It was far too painful for the blonde to remain around her child any longer than need be after she had given her away. She knew that Ebony was safe, and that was all she needed to know.

From the doorway of the inn at Montfermeil, the wife of the innkeeper stood with the woman's child in her arms. It had been very clear how very much the girl had been loved by her mother, and, by the connection she had formed in the sparse time she had known her, the blonde felt that she owed it to the other to care for the baby as she would, and did, her own child.

"Don't you fret, my child. I will keep you safe. I will look after you, I promise. My Éponine."

A/N: I wanted to get this started, but I'm not sure how long it will take. Please review anyway, to give me a bit of encouragement.


	2. Engraved with an E

Chapter Two

A/N: Thank you so much to Eponine and anonymous for reviewing my first chapter.

For six years now, young Éponine had been in the care of the Thénardier family, living under their roof for all this time, and recently in such luxury that she could have easily been mistaken for one of them by birth. In fact, one of them by birth was what she thought she was, as Madame Thénardier had never told the girl of her true family.

It had not always been so, and had only been for two years at most, ever since the other staying girl, Cosette, had arrived.

When she had come to their home, aged nearly four years old, Éponine had just turned three, yet she seemed to remember her arrival like the sun in the sky. The girl had been completely and utterly beautiful, golden hair, a ruffled dress and eyes the colour of the ocean. She was astounding, so much so that Éponine felt plain in comparison, something she had never felt during her lifetime. Well, not the lifetime that she remembered, in any case.

When she had arrived, Éponine had had to fight to be noticed by her father, who had taken extreme note of the elder girl, to see if she was any less of a disappointment than the brunette had been. At a loss of anything else to do, the girl had gone out into the street, stolen a five franc piece and brought it back to the man, catching his attention at long last. That was her first true mistake.

The moment Thénardier had seen Éponine's ability at stealing, the man had set her to work in the inn, taking possessions from the inebriated upper classes, and bringing them back to him. At least it got her noticed, and made enough money for the family to live in the lap of luxury. But most importantly for her, she had finally proved herself to the man.

She had never needed to prove herself to her mother, of course, as the woman had always babied her just as much, if not more than Azelma, the eldest sister, only seven months older than herself. At six, Éponine was still young enough not to have even questioned how this came about, and would not do so for a fair few years. For now, she was just contented with the fact that she had a sister.

Cosette, on the other hand, was soon put to work as the family skivvy, a job Éponine had painfully endured for two years previous, right from the time she had learnt to walk, fetching, carrying and delivering things to the various rooms of the inn. But, as she was older, Cosette would have far worse jobs to do, cleaning and collecting water from down in the well, right in the middle of the neighbouring forest. Still, at least she did not have to break the law, as the younger did.

Unfortunate as it may, the Thénardiers were opportunistic people, and this meant the law was little other than a tiny obstacle to be overcome. It was the attitude that poor people had always, that anything you can get is worth getting, but they weren't poor. They seemed to just be greedy, always wanting more than they needed to have, and that was how they had raised their children to be.

It had just been another working for her father, running around collecting dropped coins and knick knacks from the floor, when Éponine had come across something strangely familiar on the floor outside her mothers' bedroom. It was beautiful, a large fresh water pearl on a thick, rope effect silver chain. It lacked the fine craftsmanship of her mother's other pieces of jewellery, but it had a certain charm to it nonetheless.

Thanking her heritage for her lack of guilt at doing so, the young girl pocketed the necklace and continued on her way.

It was not until later that day that the pearl returned to the forefront of the girl's busied mind, when her mother brought it up at the dinner table, long after her father had left, spotting an opportunity to help another 'customer' to lighten their load and stay the night.

"Éponine, you didn't happen to see a necklace around the place, did you?" the woman asked, a slight hint of worry in her voice.

"Yes, I did." the child admitted. She may not usually say straight out when she had done something wrong, but she always told the truth when she was caught. She had been brought up well enough to know not to lie to people that trusted her, and so had never done so. She reached into her dress pocket and extracted the chain and pearl, holding it out to her mother. "It's right here."

The woman rather quickly made a grab for the piece of jewellery, as if she had something to hide. But the thing she had been trying to cover up was already visible to the child, who could not help but point out the detail.

"It has an 'E' on it, Mama." she commented, signalling the mentioned point on the pearl, where the engraving was clearly visible to anyone. "Look, Mama. 'E'. 'E' for Éponine."

"No, _cherie_." the woman told her adoptive daughter, in a much harsher voice than she would have wanted to do. "If it stood for Éponine, it would be 'É', not 'E'. I think one of the residents must have dropped it. I tell you what, how about you give it to me, and I will keep it safe."

It was obvious that the idea was not a questioning one, and Éponine handed over the necklace, however reluctant she seemed to be to do it.

"Thank you, _cherie_. Now, off you go to bed." Éponine knew better than to disobey when her mother was gabbling her words, as she was doing now, and so ran up the staircase before she had a chance to blink.

Left alone in the empty inn, Madame Thénardier collapsed into her chair, staring at the engraved pearl in anguish. It had been left outside, preserved in a box, and the woman knew perfectly well who it was from.

'E' for Ebony.

A/N: Please give me some feedback on this, as I probably wrote at least three quarters of this under time pressure today.


	3. The Mystery of a Stranger

Chapter Three

A/N: Thank you to ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo and Anna for reviewing the last chapter.

It had barely been three weeks since the incident with the necklace, before two consecutive bombshells threatened to break the entire Thénardier family apart.

The first was revealed in the midst of an argument between the heads of the family. The takings of the inn had dramatically decreased over the past few weeks, as a new hotel had opened just a few streets away, one where the guests did not seem to leave with far less of their belongings than they had entered with. Now, the money was beginning to run out, and the lifestyle of the family was going downhill. This was not helped by the revelation her mother had made.

She was pregnant. Her mother, a cautious and careful woman by nature, bar her thieving ways, of course, had been stupid enough to become pregnant. Or that was what her father had said, at least.

There were already four of them in the family, they could not cope with another mouth to feed, not when the takings were down, and they still needed to provide a little for Cosette. How would they survive with another child to care for, when they could hardly care for the two they already had?

That was only the beginning of the problem, as before her mother had even begun to show the evidence of her child, another obstacle made its way into the Thénardier household, and the name of that particular obstacle was Jean Valjean.

Of course, at the time, Éponine had not known the name of the mysterious stranger, only the deed he had come to accomplish. It was not until much later in her life that the girl discovered his identity.

Nonetheless, the stranger had come to their door, with a letter in his hand from a woman that he named as Fantine. She did not know who this woman was at first, but from the nature of the man's request, to take Cosette away and care for her as his own daughter, she assumed that the woman was Cosette's real mother, the one who had given her into their care in the first place. '_What does this Fantine want now? She hasn't truly contacted her daughter in years. Why would she choose now as the right time to do it?'_

The moment she had heard the conversation from below, Éponine had rushed down from her bedroom, ignoring the protests from her elder sister, Azelma, who claimed that the entrant may be dangerous, and that it was foolish to go downstairs when she herself was meant to be in bed. The younger girl knew the risks, as she had seen her father dole out punishments to Cosette and Azelma, along with being on the receiving end of a few of them over the years. However, her curiosity had gotten the better of her, and she had hidden downstairs in the tavern, beneath one of the tables at the back of the room.

"My name is _Monsieur_ Madeleine." the man said, removing his hat and inclining his head to her father, as he had come to the door to greet who he had thought to be another one of his potential customers. "I have been sent here by a woman named Fantine. She has asked me to take care of her young daughter, Cosette, who was been in your custody for a few years. I wish to take her away from you now, so that she may have a proper upbringing with a good father."

"Forgive me, _Monsieur_, but how do we know that your intentions are correct? We worry about our little gem, you see, and we would never give her away to a man who may not have the right ideas about what is right and wrong." Madame Thénardier asked, her facial expression clearly showing her disbelief of the man. Éponine could have laughed at this, knowing how much her mother would lie to get what she wished to get. In fact, the woman did not doubt his intentions at all. The only thing she wanted to get out of the situation was exactly what she had wanted from the girl in the first place. Money.

"I assure you, _Madame_. My intentions are only to ensure Cosette's wellbeing, as this letter will prove to you. It was written by Fantine's own hand, before she passed on. It explains it all to you." he explained to the blonde, his own expression making it quite plain that she was not fooling him in the least. Although she was a little thrown by this response, as it was not in the league of those she usually received, Madame Thénardier remained steadfast in her argument, ignoring her husband entirely, as he was doing little to agree with her. On the up side, something rarely seen of late in their household, he was doing nothing to speak against her either, a blessing that she would definately count, for now, at least.

"Oh, I'm sure that you have the greatest of intentions, _Monsieur_, but you see, we love the girl too much to let her go for nothing. We have put quite a lot of money into this child over the years, as much as on our own two girls. We can't just let her go now, not when she has become a part of the family." It was now a desperate attempt for the woman to receive something for what had come from nothing, but it seemed to be successful.

A few minutes later, as the man exited the inn, pulling Cosette along behind him, Éponine emerged from her position beneath the table, evidently shocking her mother immensely, as the woman gasped and pressed her hand to her chest, the banknotes in it going flying across the floor, in an attempt to slow her pounding heart.

"Oh, Éponine." the woman gasped. "You gave me a fright."

"I'm sorry, Mama." the girl responded, sounding genuinely remorseful. "I didn't mean to. I just wanted to know where Cosette had gone."

"That man, he took her." Madame Thénardier replied, but she seemed to be distant, her eyes glazing over as if she were in a daydream. The man had reminded her of someone, someone she had used to know, or at least had seen once before. He had a look about him, one that Éponine shared.

The look of Marina Sarcozet.

A/N: I know, it's another strange chapter, but I am finally getting to the point. Please review!


	4. New Beginnings

Chapter Four

A/N: Thank you to ConcreteAngelRoxHerHalo, Lesmizmaniac, number10ten, phangirl2017, Eponine Jondrette and Mary-Anne for reviewing. You all make me write.

After the brush with danger involving the strange gentleman, Madame Thénardier had been clinging to her younger daughter more than ever, even a whole year after the incident itself had occurred. However, the woman could not shield the girl from everything, and a huge blow to the family was far closer than she would have hoped for.

For months on end, takings had been steadily decreasing at the inn, and Monsieur Thénardier had been becoming much more irritable since he had discovered just how drastic their situations were going to become, due to his reckless gambling and his overly strong likeness for a drink. Now, they were going to lose it all, and no amount of pick pocketing could save them from his stupidity.

Despite the reactions she had assumed she would experience, Éponine was not as fearful about leaving the inn as she had thought she would be. In fact, strange as it seemed, there was a part of her that was quite excited about the change in their lives.

However, the other members of the family did not share her views. Her parents, her sister and even her baby brother, Gavroche, had been complaining, in some way or another, about the actions of the police turning them out of their business. They did not seem excited at all. They seemed livid.

There was nothing to be done. The police had arrived, headed up by the formidable Inspector Javert, and had turfed the family out of their home, not being afraid in the least to use brute force to ensure that the quintet, particularly Thénardier himself, were taken from their business. In truth, Éponine was not certain what had been so criminal in the actions they had been using to survive, other than the slight amount of possessions that had been taken form guests to lighten their loads as they left the doorway.

And so they had begun their long journey to the city of brilliant schemes and cunning thieves, Paris, where the Thénardiers could live out their opportunistic lifestyles while playing to their best advantages. Éponine had learnt, once her parents had said that they were going to find new ways to make money, to enjoy the idea of going to a place so teeming with life as the capital of France itself, but she had been unlucky. Despite her efforts to dissuade them, and to push them onto other paths, the pair of them had decided that she was still to work stealing for them, as Azelma had always done, and as Gavroche would be forced to do the moment he could set foot over the city line without needing his sisters to lean on.

Unfortunately, the young boy had not been as appeaseable to the idea of becoming a thief, and had even suggested running away, though all three children knew that he was not remotely old enough to do so, given that he was only bordering on the age of two and a half. This did not stop him, however, as he still insisted that he would do so, as soon as he reached the age at which he could find an appropriate place to live, for himself and for his sisters, should they wish to leave as well. Both girls were intelligent and experienced enough to know that that would be ineffective, particularly as their father was soon to become the most fearsome man in a fearsome city, as opposed to the fearsome man in Montfermeil that he had been before, and would probably remain to be, even after they had left the small town.

As they arrived in their new home, a tiny two roomed apartment in the crumbling Gorbeau building, the girls were not given the time to hang around, as they were sent out straight away to push falsified letters through the letterboxes of the _bourgeois_, in an attempt to steal some money from them to set them up for their stay, at least until they began to steal for a living, which neither of the girls expected would be long. Their father was not known for procrastinating when he could make money in a dishonest way, something that Éponine had feared had gone from being an easy way of surviving to being a hobby of choice, and nothing more than a little entertainment in a place when such a luxury was sparse, mainly because of people who committed the same heinous crimes that he had done without a second thought.

That night, the two girls lay down on the floor in the corner of the room that served as the family's living space, given that their parents had taken the only bedroom, and bed, in the place. Neither of them were able to sleep, as they had returned to the household long after dark, having been robbing for the time before this, and it had always taken them a long time to settle, though they doubted that they would, as they slept spread out on the floor. '_I wish I was as young as 'Vroche.'_ Éponine thought, a little bitterly, as she gazed over at her brother. At least he was young enough to be permitted to sleep in the armchair.

"Are you still awake, 'Ponine?" asked Azelma, glancing down the floorboards in the direction of her sister, who had chosen to sleep against the wall on the opposite end of the room. Seeing that she was, she beckoned her over. "Come here, I want to talk to you."

Strangely enough, as she did not usually do so, the younger sister obeyed, huddling close to the elder once she had crawled across the dirt strewn floor.

"You know that you can get away from all of this, don't you, 'Ponine?" she told the younger brunette, rather cryptically. "All you need to do is find one address, one specific address from somewhere, and you are away from all of this."

"What do you mean?" Éponine asked, the confusion clear in her face. "Azelma, what do you mean?"

"Why don't you ask Mama, 'Ponine?" the elder suggested, rolling onto her side and raising her right hand to cradle her head, preparing to fall into the deep sleep she had denied herself to speak to her sister, leaving the girl in a state of perpetual confusion for the remainder of the night, even as she slept, for the brief amount of time that she did so. "I'm sure that she knows all about it."

A/N: Uh oh. Might Madame Thénardier be rumbled? Perhaps she will be. Please review to find out!


	5. Awkward Questions

Chapter Five

A/N: Thank you to Frustration, phangirl2017, Smiles1998 and Anna for reviewing the last chapter.

As morning dawned over Paris, the first time they had seen such for the Thénardier family, Éponine rose with the sun, to quench the thirst for knowledge that Azelma had left her with in the first minutes of the morning, once they had returned from their duties to the gang that her father had formed within the very first day, a couple of whom had come with them from Montfermeil and one or two that he had fished out from the dark alleyways of the city, where they had been unsuccessfully attempting to rob a couple of back alley prostitutes. Or at least her mother had said that they tried to rob them, at least, while Azelma had told her that they had done something worse, which she would not specify.

Carefully, the young girl rose from her position on the floor, being careful where to tread, as she knew that the floorboards were extremely old and rickety, and creaked very loudly should the wrong one be stepped on. She did not wish to wake Azelma, after all, as she feared that the elder would regret what she had said, and would attempt to stop her from seeking the answers she wished to know.

When she reached her mother's bedroom door, the girl suddenly paused, fear taking over her for a moment. It was not her mother's chamber alone, after all, but belonged to both of her parents and, despite the fact that he had never been too terrible about Éponine speaking to her mother once in a while in the mornings, if she woke him from his slumber by knocking, there would be hell to pay. Still, her mother would protect her, as she always did, when her father turned nasty, which he had always done, on occasion, though he did it far more frequently as she became older. His temper had always been short, but her mother had one to rival it, and she would continue to do so.

Fighting her fears, as her mother had taught her, the brunette knocked on the door, hoping beyond hope that her father had already left the apartment, the only time she had ever really wished for her father to be committing crime, as he seemed so fond of doing. However, as she opened the door, inch by inch, she was glad to see that only one side of the bed was occupied, and that it was her mother who remained complacent in the day's takings. Her father was nowhere to be seen, and so she could only assume that he had already gone out, something which she found herself more thankful for than she would have thought she would be all those years ago.

"Éponine, is that you?" the woman asked, the tone of her voice clearly showing the haze of sleep which still covered her mind. She let out a less than subtle yawn, before she sat up in her bed, patting the covers beside her, in an indication for her younger daughter to sit beside, which she did, snuggling down beneath the rough fabric of the covers as if she had never felt a blanket before. "Good morning, _ma cherie_. Are you alright?"

"Yes, thank you, Mama." she responded, though she did not sound quite as convincing as she would have wished to do. It seemed that her mother had also picked up on this fact, as her brow furrowed a little in confusion.

"Are you sure about that, Éponine?" the elder questioned once again, as evident proof that the young child's attempts had not been successful. "You seem to be a little bit distracted. What is on your mind, _ma petite_?"

"It is just something that Azelma said to me last night. I just can't seem to forget about it, and so I wanted to ask you about it." she explained, her voice suddenly made timid by her mother's questioning, despite the determination that had been a part of her spirit until she had entered the room.

"Of course, my darling. What is it?" Madame Thénardier questioned, her voice almost as soft as her young daughter's, though it was for the purpose of calming her a little, rather than out of fear.

"I don't know, not for certain. She said that if I wanted to, I could get away from here, from her and you and Papa and Gavroche, if I found an address." the girl spoke, but trailed off after she had done so, when she saw the look that had surfaced on her mother's face. It was almost as if she was hurt by this statement, like an air of loss that was yet to come. The brunette did not yet know what had been the cause of this reaction in a woman so calm as her mother, but the woman knew all too well what her elder daughter was speaking of.

"Did she say what the address was?" she asked, a note of hope in her tone, which obviously suggested that she wanted the answer to be no.

"No, she didn't. She told me to ask you." If this had not been the truth, Éponine realised that she would most likely have considered lying, as her mother seemed so desperate for the answer she wanted to hear. It was almost pitiful to see her mother so fearful, as the girl had never once seen the woman when she was not at her strongest.

"_Well, Éponine, I suppose that it is right for you to know." Madame Thénardier sighed, preparing herself mentally for what was to come. "When you were a baby, there was a woman, back in Montfermeil, who turned up on our doorstep begging for help. She had no money, too many children to support, and so she wished for her youngest daughter, Ebony, to have a better life. And so she gave her to me, and I changed her name. That was you, Éponine."_

The redhead shook her head a little to clear it. Perhaps that was what she should have said, confessed it all to her little girl there and then and taken the risk of losing her. After all, the woman could very well be better off now, and wishing for her daughter back. But one look at the girl's face told her that she could not do so. And so she gave the only answer she could.

"There is no address of that manner that I know of, Éponine."

A/N: Liar! Please review!


	6. Saviour of a Street Rat

Chapter Six

A/N: Thank you to Smiles1998, phangirl2017 and IvyGreen13 for reviewing the last chapter.

Another half of a year had passed, and still Madame Thénardier had managed to keep Éponine from learning the truth that Azelma had almost given away. She had been extremely cautious when speaking to the girl at all, and had given a stern talking to the elder one, warning her that her younger sister could not know the truth, for fear that it would tear the whole family apart.

Meanwhile, she had not noticed that the brunette was being sent out far more often to go and pickpocket, and in areas with more and more police by the day. It seemed that her father no longer cared for the girl, other than as a thief, though she doubted that he had ever really done. To him, she had only been another criminal, bringing him just another few sous to gamble and lose. She had never been anything more.

However, him not treating her as a daughter did not mean at all that the man did not acknowledge her place in the household, as she had rather hoped that it would do. Whenever he came home, frustrated at a brush with the police, or drunk out of his skull on good wine after a great days takings, in the most literal sense of the word, the man would lash out upon his arrival at their home, and it would be Éponine who took the brunt of the beatings, rather than his wife and other children. She did not know why this was, as she was not the eldest, and she was only a girl, so why was it always her that was hurt, when she was his own child just as much as Gavroche and Azelma were. It made no sense, and so she had taken a walk to clear her head, not really minding if she was beaten when she got home for leaving the house, as she most likely would be beaten in any case.

And so she had decided to take a stroll down the streets of Paris, and not only the streets of the slums that she had been accustomed to since moving to the area, but venturing out in the streets of the middle classes, even to the edges of the streets inhabited by only the _bourgeoisie_, a people far above the likes of herself, a lowly street rat from a town in the middle of nowhere, especially considering what her father employed her to do from day to day.

However, the streets, she had found, were rather winding, and she had taken a wrong turning on her way back to the apartment building, finding herself instead outside a grand imposing one, though its purpose was the one thing she could not distinguish, as she had never seen the likes of it in all of her life. On the other hand, the reason behind that may have been that she grew up in a small town, with none of the luxuries that Paris life seemed to have for the rich to use. Of course, it did not truly matter what the purpose was, as there was not a chance in hell that the child would ever be grand enough to make use of it.

Suddenly, a loud bell sounded, and in her childish ignorance, Éponine wondered whether it had been rung for the purposes of moving her away from the steps, which she had sat herself down on, given the terrible ache that had begun to spread through her legs. But as soon as she saw the doors open, dozens or maybe even a hundred boys pouring through them, she realised that the building was, in fact, merely a school, in which the students had come to the end of their day of education.

On further observation, which she achieved by the fact that she had moved to the corner of the steps, so that she was hidden behind the small wall situated there, the brunette realised that there was more than one reason as to why she would not be able to attend the institution, as every one of the students were male. It seemed to be the belief of the upper classes that only men were good enough to be educated properly, as if girls were not important enough to be able to do so. Well, she would have proved them wrong, had she been able, and had her mind not been taken from the subject by a shadow above her.

When she glanced up to ascertain who the figure was, she found that it was a boy, one who could only have been around ten years old. Not a great deal older than her, at any rate, as that much was evident, both in his appearance and his tone of voice when he spoke to her. "What are you doing here?"

Though the words could be easily associated with snobbery, the tone in which he spoke them was one of concern, rather than contempt for her lower class. Seeing that the boy was merely trying to be helpful, she answered him, although her voice was still barely more of a whisper. "I was just walking, and I got lost. I only just moved here, and I don't know my way around. I don't know how to get home."

"Don't worry, I'll help you find your way home." he offered, and once again, Éponine was shocked by the amount of concern he seemed to have for a street rat girl that he had never met before. "I've lived here in Paris for all of my life, and I know my way around. I'm sure that I could help you find the place that you're looking for."

Taking the girl's hands, he pulled her from the ground, and they set off in the direction of the Gorbeau apartment building, which the boy, named Marius Pontmercy, knew by its infamous reputation.

However, as they turned their backs and began to walk away, a professor emerged from the shadows, glancing in the direction of the girl as if she were a celestial being, as he remembered the little baby girl that his mother had given away, when he had been only fifteen.

A/N: So, 'Ponine's old family are closing in! Please review!


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